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by Brigdh



Category: Benjamin January Mysteries - Barbara Hambly
Genre: Family, Gen, Prompt Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-23
Updated: 2014-01-23
Packaged: 2018-01-09 19:00:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1149638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brigdh/pseuds/Brigdh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gabriel gets an aunt and uncle. </p><p>(Set between <i>A Free Man of Color</i> and <i>Fever Season</i>.)</p>
            </blockquote>





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**Author's Note:**

> Written for somebraveapollo on LJ, to the prompt: Gabriel Corbier, "Momma once told me / You're already home where you feel loved" (The Head and the Heart: Lost in My Mind).

Mama didn’t have a family. She must’ve used to have one, because everyone had to, but whoever they'd been they weren't around no more, and she never talked about them. Once Gabriel had asked her where she came from, but she only said, “That ain’t no concern of yours,” and set him to scrubbing the big cooking pot.

He couldn’t picture Mama as a little girl. Not a normal one, anyway, not like his sisters or Jeanne from next door. They cried and tattled secrets and dragged their doll-babies everywhere; he knew Mama had always been tall and strong and brave.

So one day when a man and woman came to dinner, and Mama told Gabriel to call them Uncle Ben and Aunt Minou, he wondered if maybe she had made them herself, called them up out of blood or herbs or just the right color candle so she could have a family too. Normal brothers and sisters didn’t just arrive like that, with no warning and already full-grown. Besides, there had to be parents for there to be children, and no one mentioned a grand-père or grand-mère.

But if they were spirits, they didn’t show any signs of it, and Gabriel had watched them real close. They looked and talked just like anyone else, and when Uncle Ben shook his hand, it felt solid and warm. Their shadows didn’t go off for walks or turn into animals, the way Will said ghosts’ were always doing.

Just in case, though, he didn’t go too close, and after they left he tried to get Mama to tell him who they really were. But no matter how much he promised to keep it a secret, she wouldn’t change her story.

“You didn’t have no brother and sister yesterday,” he said stubbornly.

“Oh, and you know everything there is to know, do you?” she said, but she wasn’t really mad; he could tell. She scrubbed her fingers through his hair, looking at him like she was thinking about something else. “Sometimes you just got to let yesterday go, Gabriel. It can get in your way.”

“So... who are they?”

She rolled her eyes and thumped him lightly on the back of his head. “They’re my family, and that’s all I got to say about it. Don’t let me catch you being rude to them.”


End file.
